


With liberty and cookies for all

by Pigsinspaaace



Series: Roommates AU [5]
Category: Carry On - Rainbow Rowell
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-21
Updated: 2017-01-21
Packaged: 2018-09-19 01:23:45
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,044
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9411245
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pigsinspaaace/pseuds/Pigsinspaaace
Summary: This is a shamelessly self-indulgent way to make myself feel better by writing my darling goofballs dealing with Trump. Thus the cross fandom. I wanted to throw the Amis in too, but somehow restrained myself (in my head, though, they're there too.)So since in my Carry On AU, Simon et al have graduated from  college, and in my (probably never to be posted) TRC AU, Adam et al are still in high school, the scenario in this thing is plausible. Well, plausible might be a strong word. But, whatever. This is what I've got.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I just made cookies. Chocolate chip. And pecan. I didn't even realize what I was doing til they were done. I'd been thinking about Simon, about how he would've brought cookies to JFK on Saturday. 
> 
> It's Tuesday. Only ten days since the inauguration, the protests, this chapter. But it's like an eternity. 
> 
> After Yates and Quebec and the frightening pace with which this has gone from outrageous to completely terrifying - I haven't had the [I don't know what- soul? Spirit? Strength? Imagination?] to do anything as productive as write. 
> 
> Apparently Simon was pissed off and it came out as cookies. I wish I could send one to each of you through some kind of ao3 magic. I'm thinking of you as I'm eating them.

Baz groaned but didn't resist as Agatha pulled the hand-knit pink hat with ears onto his head. If nothing else, that would be enough to let anyone know that something was seriously fucking wrong.

Unfortunately, none of them needed that particular bit of evidence. They were all well aware of how fucked up things had gotten. Which is why Simon had learned how to knit, and why the four of them were wearing matching pussy hats as they headed outside.

Sort of matching, anyway. Simon’s was the only one that looked like it had been made by someone who had just learned to knit. Penny turned out to be an irritatingly quick learner (big surprise there) and Baz had raised an astonished eyebrow at the idea that he was going to knit the wretched thing. Bad enough that he was wearing it. So Agatha made his, too.  

The truth was, though, that Baz would have fucking learned to knit if he thought there was any chance it would shake Simon out of the disturbing quiet he'd sunk into. (Into which he'd sunk, Baz’s mind disdainfully reproached. Baz told his mind to kindly fuck off.)

Penny was unsuccessfully trying to hide how impatient she was getting. She wasn't thrilled to begin with, that they were protesting in NYC and not D.C. But Simon refused to close the bakery for two days just to go to Washington, and Penny refused to leave Simon, so here they were.

Or here they weren't, rather. Simon had gone to pick up the new kid who worked with him at the bakery. They were already late, and the whole cookie plan made no sense to begin with. Hence, Penny’s irritation. But a moment before she finally lost it, Simon and the kid showed up, and they could finally head downtown.

The two of them were carrying ludicrously giant boxes of cookies. Not even Baz understood why Simon had insisted on bringing enough cookies to feed half the city. Nevertheless, he had glared murderously at Agatha when she started to object and Simon started to look agitated. Agatha had muttered something that sounded like _insufferably overprotective dickhead,_ but hadn't pushed the issue again.

Simon was fine with not being understood. He had no extra energy for explanations and understanding. He was so tired all the time again, now. Everything hurt, his heart hurt, and muffled panic clogged his mind no matter how many times he tried breathing slowly and shit like that.

And anyway it wasn't their fucking business. He wasn't going to close the bakery. The new kid, Adam, couldn't afford to lose three days of work. Simon knew there was no way Adam would accept being paid for not working.

The irony was not lost on him.

So he was paying Adam to help him bring cookies to the protest. The fact that there would now be cookies at the protest was icing on the cake, so to speak.

He was second guessing his insistence on walking, though. The kid always looked ready to collapse from exhaustion, and maybe lugging thirty pounds of chocolate chip cookies half way across the city wasn't the best thing for him. But being outside with a job to do had erased some of the shadows from Adam's face, so it was probably ok.

Penny kept throwing furtive glances Simon's way. Baz didn't bother to hide the fact that he was watching him closely, too. He'd been watching him all week. Simon wished they would stop, but he figured their regression to worrying about him wasn't that different from his regression into silence, so he let it go.

Only Agatha strode along, seemingly impervious to the fact that time sometimes moved the wrong direction these days. She was kind of brilliant in her fierce indifference to their particular configuration of problems. She was too busy tweeting to notice anything.

Simon was ok with that. He was fucking delighted with it. At least Aggie's focus on taking advantage of her fame to mobilize people occasionally drew Baz and Penny's attention away from him. And right now, Simon wanted to be ignored. Invisible. Small, secret, insignificant. Hidden.

The panic was always with him. Every time some new terrible thing happened (every fucking cabinet appointment, every fucking hateful word that his friends found scrawled on doors and walls, every fucking news report of hate crimes and harassment, every fucking reference to rights and safety and shared responsibility that disappeared from the White House website within hours of the inauguration), Simon’s mind whispered _that's it, it won't get worse, someone will make this stop. That has to be the end of it._

It was that weird automatic denial that made him aware of how fucking panicked he was. His waking, speaking mind held no illusions that this was anywhere near over. So it was just his brain trying to fool itself off the edge of the cliff; there was no other way to explain the familiar, sickening feeling of _no more no more no more._

He didn't try to talk himself out of it. It was warranted. Something impossible, terrible, was happening, and no one was stopping it, and he couldn't do anything to make it end.

Except, maybe, this. Wear a hat with ears. Carry cookies.

They eventually give in to reason and hop on the subway. When they get out at Grand Central, they follow a river of pussy-hatted strangers into the chanting crowd.

As they hand out cookies to people carrying signs with messages ranging from earnest (Re _sistance is the new normal_ ) to angry ( _FUCK TRUMP_ ) to goofy (C _an't comb over sexism_ ), the words of the crowd morph and shift until the air reverberates with the newly minted chant, “eat our cookies!”

Baz opens his mouth (to join in? to laugh? to yawn? the world will never know), and Simon stuffs a cookie in it. Baz splutters. Penny’s smile doesn't quite reach her eyes, and Agatha’s smile is more weapon than grin. But Simon’s smile settles warmly across his face, like a sister who's decided to stay just a little longer.

They give out an astonishing quantity of cookies astonishingly quickly. People shout their approval at Penny’s banner ( _Not because she's your daughter. Not because she's your mother. Because she is a person_.) and laugh delightedly at Agatha’s ( _Let's all just queef on him_ ).

Penny has just started to let herself feel heartened by the size and friendliness of the crowd, when she hears Adam (polite, controlled Adam) snap “hands off, asshole.”

She looks up. A tall guy with a shaved head and a leather jacket looms over Adam, one hand in the process of grabbing four cookies out of the nearly empty box Adam is carrying. Despite his protest, Adam is letting him.

Penny’s about to run over and rescue Adam when she catches herself. Adam is sensitive about help, about being perceived as in need of rescuing. She doesn't know the new kid well, but even she knows that much. So she waits and watches, ready to intervene if the asshole gets any more aggressive.

She barely has time to think _doesn't that kid know what a fucking cliché he is_ , before an even more unlikely looking guy walks up. This one looks like he made a wrong turn on his way to a young republicans meeting; he looks like the heir to an unwitting kingdom. But he's holding a giant sign shaped like a vagina that says _Pussy Power_. As Penny watches, shocked, he bumps fists with Adam and grabs one of the pilfered cookies from the skinhead.

The King and the Cookie Thief are quickly joined by a wacky group of people who clearly know and adore Adam. One kid’s holding a glittery sign that reads _I_   _can't believe we still have to protest this shit_. One has enough hair to make up for the bald kid, rising in a gravity-defying tribute to modern advances in hair gel. He holds a garish orange sign that demands  _Trump has toupee_.

Tall Hair is standing next to an angry, pale, beautiful girl whose sign (in defiance of all sign best practices) is covered in paragraphs and paragraphs of facts and numbers.

There’s another girl. This one is tiny, and wearing a bizarre coat that’s clearly homemade. The coat is bizarre because it appears to be missing about a third of itself, or maybe a quarter. Penny is mystified until the girl catches her eye and turns around slowly. Tagged to the back of her coat is a sign that explains _I can only afford 77% of a coat_. Penny cracks up.

Having determined that this posse is in fact Adam’s, Penny turns to grab an oblivious Simon to drag him over and say hi.

Simon, however, is not the least bit oblivious. He’s looking with unguarded happiness at Adam, whose shoulders have relaxed and whose face breaks into a silly grin as the tiny girl with the coat stands on tiptoes to pull a pink hat onto his head.

Simon doesn't miss the way that Adam’s fingers brush lightly along the hand of the teen-angst poster child. Nor does he fail to notice the way said child looks at Adam with a smirk that utterly fails to mask the smitten warmth in his eyes.

The familiar gesture causes Simon and Penny simultaneously to turn and look at Baz. When Baz notices, he smirks and then looks confused when that sends the pair of them into a giggling fit. He follows their gaze back to Adam and his friends, and something flashes across his face that even Simon can't interpret.

Simon and Penny keep trying to drift closer to Adam ( _sorry! Excuse me! Just trying to get to our friends! Thanks! Sorry! Thanks!_ ). Meanwhile, Baz somehow strides quickly (seriously, the bastard looks graceful even pushing his way through a crowd) over to Tall Hair and Pale Angry Girl.

Surprisingly, Angry Girl’s face softens and she smiles up at Baz with obvious joy.

“Baz!”

“Mordelia?”

They haven't seen each other since the debacle of her birthday party. By now, everyone is watching them. Baz puts his hand gently on her head, and she doesn’t shrug it off.

Tall Hair is openly gaping.

The moment is broken by Agatha (because of course) who cackles “oh my god it's Helen’s baby brother!” and reaches out to pinch the King’s cheeks.

Adam and the Cookie Thief look at each other and gravely say “coincidence” at the same time (because it isn't). Inexplicably, this makes them double over, laughing.

Penny’s never heard Adam laugh before. It's like magic. It's magic and she wishes Adam could remain a magician, laughing that way forever.

As they shuffle slowly onward toward Trump tower (any pretense of marching has been abandoned by now, lost in the crowded throng of way too many people acting way too nice), introductions are sorted out and exclamations exchanged.

Penny allows herself to fall back a little. Just enough to be able to enjoy the sight of Simon, happy. His arm is around Baz, whose other arm is around Mordy. Just in front of them, a version of Adam she's never imagined (let alone witnessed) is lightly exchanging affectionate insults with his friends. (And even more affectionate, poorly-concealed touches with the Cookie Thief.)

Penny’s impatient, frenzied thoughts settle for the first time since November.

This is how it's going to be. Their world will be slowly undone by an evil they'd foolishly thought buried. They'll keep being shocked by every new bloody hole the undoing rips in their world.

But they'll also keep their arms around each other. They'll try to staunch the flow of gore that bleeds through each new slash. They'll try to hold on for as long as they can. They’ll try to fight the darkness together. Until either everything is undone, or the undoing finally ends and the rebuilding begins.

Their strange group keeps not-marching up fifth avenue. Sometimes they join in the chanting. Sometimes they get the crowd to join in their own. (He's orange! He's gross! He lost the popular vote!) Their progress is halting and incremental and unbearably slow. But they keep going, and, eventually, they make it.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Yeah, the tense shifts halfway through. I'd pretend it's a brilliant commentary on the nature of time, but honestly, it's just an error that I've given up on fixing. 
> 
> The following will be sappy and boringly earnest: 
> 
> There's a demon undoing us. (Not Trump, but everything his power feeds on. Racism, misogyny, homophobia, xenophobia, hatred and fear and intolerance and a readiness to believe that we're not all equally human.)
> 
> We've let the knowledge of its existence pale while we pursued hope and magic and wishes, but now we can't ignore it, and maybe we should've been better at destroying it before it got this powerful again, but what kind of life is that? Always fighting the demons and never reaching for the gods?
> 
> Maybe in real life we can at least stop it before it kills Ronan's mother? But probably not. And that sucks.


End file.
